The principle of parametric pumping was first applied to the separation of fluid mixtures by Wilhelm et al., I & EC Fundamentals, Vol. 5, No. 1, pp. 141-145 (1966). Broadly, this separation process utilized a packed bed of adsorbent particles in a column equipped with means for establishing a thermodynamic gradient therein by providing a heat source and a heat sink at opposite ends of the column. Pumping the fluid mixture cyclically through the column resulted in differential solute concentrations occurring at the column ends. In Recent Developments in Separation Science, Vol. 1, N. Li, Editor, Chemical Rubber Co., Cleveland, Ohio, pp. 59-74 (1972), N. H. Sweed described parametric pumping processes and discussed their use in the separation of both gas and fluid mixtures. H. T. Chen et al. in a paper presented at the 73rd National Meeting of the American Institute of Chemical Engineers, Minneapolis, August, 1972, described an attempt to achieve multicomponent separation of glucose and fructose from water by a parametric pump separation process using Fuller's earth as adsorbent. The process proved to be less than completely successful because of the very slow transfer rate and breakdown of the Fuller's earth after a short period of use. Chen et al., AIChE J., Vol. 21, No. 4, pp. 813-815 (1975), reported obtaining about a 13 percent fructose enrichment in the separation of a glucose-fructose-water mixture by means of a parametric pumping process utilizing Bio-Rad AG 50W-X4 (Ca.sup.2+) resin as the fractionation medium and column gradient temperatures of 5.degree. and 55.degree. C. R. Gupta discusses the theory of parametric pumping in "Analysis of Parametric Pumping Separation and Reactor Systems" (PhD Thesis, Princeton University, Princeton, N.J., 1973).